TheXponential | Biyang Wang, LCSW
Remote Psychotherapy & Consulting
The Process of Letting Go: Recovering From Addiction
The Process of Letting Go: Recovering From Addiction
Some people believe addiction results from a lack of willpower — that the person simply doesn’t want to get better and could easily stop if they really tried. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Addiction is much more complex, insidious, and unforgiving than people realize.
What you will learn from this article:
What is addiction?
Addiction can manifest in many forms. It is often associated with physical dependence on substances such as drugs and alcohol, where the diagnosis of an addiction disorder requires withdrawal symptoms in the absence of the substance. However, behavioral addictions also occur when despite all the negative consequences and severe disruptions to one’s day-to-day life, the individual is unable to fight off compulsive urges to engage. This means that repeated engagement in toxic relationships, codependency, gambling, sex, food, self harm, perfectionism, self criticisms, and other irrational beliefs and thought patterns also fall under the category of “addiction.”
Instead of focusing on the “what,” it’s more helpful to identify with the mentality, pattern of behavior, the neural and physical mechanisms, and the trappings of the vicious cycle. It’s important that we remove the exclusive reference of “addiction” to substance abuse, and provide a framework to help anyone feeling stuck and helpless in an unwanted dependency and reliance, to find hope and freedom in Recovery.
How can you tell?
Signs that your habit, dependence, or pattern of behavior has evolved into the cycle of addiction:
When people experience stress, anxiety, and emotional pain, the reward from the substance provides an immediate relief. However, as the pleasure and high wears off, the body signals the brain that it needs more. Overtime, your brain learns to seek the substance/behavior to relieve the pain, thus the initial pleasure is no longer “special,” but becomes a necessity to bring you back to baseline.
When you consume drugs and alcohol, or engage in the compulsive behavior, your brain’s reward network is flooded with feel-good chemicals, which provides your body with a jolt of pleasure and satisfaction. This experience is extremely impressionable, and your brain creates a memory which triggers your body to crave the addicted agent.
With continued use of and engagement in the substance or behavior, respectively, the pleasure and reward becomes routine. Your brain becomes convinced that this is now a basic need for survival, along with others like drinking, eating, and sleeping.
Initially, the substance/behavior positively impacted your life by providing you with pleasure and relief. When use turns to an addiction, your brain no longer finds the pleasure novel, but a routine necessity. LIke clockwork, the urge triggers a chain reaction where pursuit of the substance becomes automated, and it’s very hard to break the cycle.
Over time, as your reward system becomes conditioned to crave and expect the substance, the “executive function” area of the brain – the prefrontal cortex – begins to weaken. Since this area of the brain is in charge of planning, decision-making, risk analysis, and impulse control, you’re at a physiological disadvantage when it comes to fighting urges and resisting temptation. This is why despite the negative consequences, when the urge hits, it’s as if everything else falls on the wayside, and your mind won’t rest until the craving is satisfied.
Getting Ready for Recovery
People who have struggled with an addiction for a long time often feel trapped in their own bodies and minds, wanting to get out of this vicious cycle, and yet feeling powerless against the allure of addictive patterns and behaviors. They go through life holding their breaths constantly anticipating the other shoe to drop, while desperately hoping for the magical cure.
It’s important to remember that Addiction is not a matter of willpower. It is rooted in your emotions, whether it’s to cope with distress, numb uncomfortable feelings, gain an illusion of control, or something else, there is a reason it’s been around for so long, and so difficult to let go of. If it was quick, simple, and easy, you would’ve let it go a long time ago.
Recovery starts with an exhale – the releasing of “can’t,” “won’t,” “never,” “always,” and the fear that it’s too late. It’s not about what should’ve, could’ve, or would’ve been in the past, or may be in the future. It’s about the Present Moment, realizing that you’re tired of the damage and suffering it’s caused, and that the perceived comfort, safety, and protection of your addiction is no longer (and never was) genuine or effective.
Before you can accept a new way of life, you must be willing to let go of what has been your security for so long. You may understand this well, but also feel scared by it. Perhaps you’ve wondered, “Who am I without my addiction?” When something has consumed so much of your life, it may be difficult to visualize a separation.
The truth is that you cannot hold on to your illness and be in recovery at the same time. Perhaps you’ve tried to let go many times in the past, only to find yourself still hanging on to the pieces you’re convinced to be “not so bad.”
Many people enter treatment at the height of their suffering and desperation, and are highly motivated to do whatever it takes to recover once and for all. However, once symptoms decrease, they decide that these initial sessions were enough to “fix” the problem. They may decide to reduce or leave treatment completely. However, many then find themselves suffering a relapse or their illness getting worse. Eventually, you realize that the only way to fully recover is to commit fully to the treatment program, and let go of anything that stands in your way, or the illness return again and again. It may lay dormant during periods throughout your life, but the roots remain.
Feeling impatient and frustrated with recovery is a natural part of the process. Behavior change is hard work, and much easier described than achieved. The key here is to start slowly and proceed steadily. Change isn’t just behavioral, but also mental, emotional, and physiological, as your body and brain return to health.
It can be helpful to have a sense of urgency, but recovery is a process of healing that can’t be rushed. The good news is that recovery is a PROCESS, not a finish line, which means the benefits will appear and remain along the way.
Where are you now?
You might have heard of Stages of Change before, which more accurately refers to one’s Level of Readiness to change. It’s not a step-by-step manual, and more a blueprint to help you navigate what may feel like a scary, uncertain, and open-ended process. It’s common to move back and forth between stages, and not in the same direction or order.
Some clients visualize a game of hopscotch: a few steps forward, a few steps backward, losing your balance and catching yourself, falling down and getting up.
- Pre-Contemplation – You don’t believe that you have a problem.
- Contemplation – You admit that you have a problem, but are still ambivalent about your ability to change. You can express a desire to change, but are unwilling to fully commit to taking action.
- Preparation – You are confident in your desire to try to change. You may still feel doubt at times, but you are willing to explore your options and lay out a plan of action.
- Action – You’re tired of suffering, and have decided that treatment is ……. You’re not jumping for joy, but despite the discomfort that therapy will likely trigger, you’re fully committed to your plan, and to yourself.
- Maintenance – You’ve undergone treatment, and have gained the insights, learned the skills, and built the tools to deal with the urges when they surface.
- Lapse / Relapse- Optional and Perfectly Acceptable: Some people only need 1 course of treatment to last them a lifetime, which is awesome. But slips, and even relapse, can be a normal part of the process. There will be times when you give in to an urge, momentarily remember why the addiction came about in the first place, and doubt creeps in about whether all the discomfort, time, and energy is worth it. This may last a few minutes, a few day, a few weeks, perhaps longer. But eventually, you’ll find yourself stuck again in the chain of suffering, and decide once again that you want to let go once and for all.
- Termination – You have been free from your patterns and behaviors for a sufficient amount of time to feel confident and secure in your ability to maintain recovery, despite occasional urges. This isn’t a finish line or a final destination, but rather a return to a healthier, more hopeful, and authentic way of being. This is only possible after you’ve gone through periods of strong urges and was able to apply your adaptive coping skills and made the recovery-oriented choice.
It’s natural and common to experience ups and downs in your recovery journey. Even if you find the addictive behavior revolting in the moment, remember that it has served you well in the past and evolved as an adaptive response to help you cope when life felt unmanageable and out of control.
Don’t give up.
Remember that you are not alone.
If you’re ready to let go and work towards full recovery, there are professionals, groups, organizations, and people in recovery you can reach out to for support.
Desire vs. Commitment
The commitment to recovery is not always the same as the desire to recover. Most people who acknowledge their addiction as a severe disruption to their daily living and barrier to wellness have a desire for recovery, whether or not they are committed to doing the hard work to fight the battle. Desire is a wish for the goal to be attained. However, commitment is more than an emotion or ideal; it signifies the a willingness to take action, despite the time, patience, and difficulties along the way.
Desire is necessary as an inspiration and catalyst for commitment to occur. However, desire alone is insufficient to attain and sustain recovery. It takes consistent effort, practice, time, and dedication for change to occur, and last in the long-run.
As you begin to let go of your addiction, you may experience feelings of loss, longing, and fluctuating levels of hope. On days when you were able to make the recovery choices, you may feel more positive. Other times, especially in times of stress, you may reflexively return to old behaviors in hopes of finding relief. However, you’ll soon find yourself in a downward spiral of hopelessness and suffering, and realize that the addiction will always be a monster, not a friend.
Trust your resolve. Listen to your Inner Voice. There is a reason why you are here today, and it’s not because you want to stay where you are.
It takes courage, faith, and the belief that it’s never too late, too hopeless, too hard, or too messed up.
Now is the time and place to start
Recovery requires action, but the change comes from deep inner work. You can be honest and accepting of where you are in the moment, but moving forward means knowing where you are mentally, and commit to following through no matter how uncomfortable you may feel.
Your choice of addiction originally evolved as an adaptive response to cope with suffering, and deal with uncomfortable emotions. When life became unmanageable and out of control, the addiction stepped in to keep you in equilibrium and get through life. Therefore, the earlier stages of recovery can feel destabilizing, scary, and uncomfortable, as you’re letting go of something you’ve relied on for so long. This can be confusing. After all, if people enter recovery to relieve themselves of their suffering and live a more joyful life, how can recovery feel even worse?
Emotions change more slowly than behaviors. A lot of people wait for the day that they feel absolutely confident and ready before choosing recovery. However, confidence is not a requirement, but a product of action. It takes multiple attempts and small victories before you can trust the positive feelings and outcomes of recovery.
Wherever you are is the place to start.
If you’re honestly ready to accept that the short-term benefits of your addiction trumps the long-term benefits of recovery, you may rationalize why now is not the “right” time to enter treatment and recovery.
If you’re still in this stage of ambivalence and denial, and decide to enter treatment due to external pressures from family, friends, health professional, you may find yourself going through the motions just to get these folks off your back. This lack of commitment will significantly decrease the effectiveness of treatment, and impact how much you get out of the process.
However, this doesn’t mean waiting until you feel 100% ready to commit once and for all. If you’re already spending the time to attend treatment, you might as well relax and keep an open-mind, if only out of curiosity. It’s possible that your commitment may change over time, or not- no expectations.
It’s like first taking off your shoes and stepping into the sand, and then dipping your toes into the water along the shoreline.
If you’ve cycled through addiction, recovery, and relapse again and again, but are now finally at a breaking point of “No MORE!,” you may have arrived at the logical conclusion to commit to treatment and recovery. But this doesn’t mean that you will always feel this way, all the time, or else you go back to square one. It’s natural to have fluctuating levels of hope, and mixed feelings towards commitment.
A lot of the mixed feelings and ambivalence comes from Fear:
Fear of Uncertainty
Fear of Failure (maybe again)
Fear of Pain
Fear of Time and Hard Work
Fear of Disappointment
This is why it’s important to circle back to your intellectual decision to enter recovery, and focus on the logical aspects of treatment, despite your resistance in the moment.
Just for today...
Choose ONE Addiction thought or behavior that you are willing to challenge and release.
Alongside, also indicate a Recovery thought or behavior you’re ready to substitute in its place.
Repeat this every day, and make it a daily ritual.
You don’t have to come up with something new each day. It’s OK to work on releasing the same maladaptive thought or behavior, and practicing the Recovery thought or behavior in its place.
However, commit to a goal of doing something each and every day: when you wake up, when brushing your teeth in the mirror, while taking a walk, while sipping your coffee/tea, as you stare into space…
There is no Right or Wrong, or Perfect way to recovery. You can do one thought or behavior at a time, or feel free to work on a few. But be mindful of not taking on too much, and setting yourself up for failure.. This is actually one of the addictive mindsets of All-or-Nothing. Don’t let the quick fix narrative trick you.
Recovery is about kindness and patience. The consistent intention and practice will help you gather small victories and build a sense of mastery and confidence.
Recovery is a Decision. Each and every moment is an opportunity to renew your commitment and make the recovery choice.
Today, I will release:
Instead, I will practice:
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